Going Wheels-Up In Search of Single Digit Time Slips in a Turbocharged ’69 Beetle
Wandering the staging lanes at Sick Week, it could be exactly what you would expect to see at a drag-and-drive. Camaros, Mustangs, pick-up trucks, and maybe a sleeper or two that leaves you wondering what it has under a flat stock hood.
And then you stumble across a Volkswagen Beetle. It’s easy to appreciate the quality dark blue paint job, accented by a set of polished wheels. But then you catch the parachute, and wonder is it necessary. So, you wait to see the pass from this Bug, and a 9.97 at 143 mph pops on the scoreboard! You’ve got to know more!
Steven Dalton is the man behind the Beetle, but Sick Week is not his first drag-and-drive appearance. “I did my first drag-and-drive at Hot Rod Drag Week in 2017,” said Steven. “It was with the same car, but with a bolt-in roll bar and a pump gas 2800 cc (171 cubic inches) nitrous motor.” The Beetle averaged a 10.77 elapsed time in completing the week, with a best pass of 10.56 at 127 mph.
Fast forward two years, and Steven had changed up his combination a bit. “I showed up to Drag Week 2019 with the same car, but with a turbocharged 2660 cc (162 cubic inches) air-cooled flat four VW engine,” Steven said. “That year, the car was averaging a 10.40 for the week, until it broke both axles on the first pass of the last day.” That slowed his average to a 12.35, but the turbocharged combination showed promise with three passes at 137 mph.
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After a couple years away from drag-and-drive, Steven tried his hand at a new event, Rocky Mountain Race Week 2.0. “I ran RMRW 2.0 with the same combination, and averaged a 10.35, with a best pass of 10.06 at 140 mph,” Steven admitted.
The new turbocharged combination was still showing improvement, but Steven wanted more. “I've never ran a single digit pass with the car before, and Sick Week seems like a pretty good place to do it!”
So, the Beetle made its first Sick Week appearance in 2023, and after getting through tech and registration on Sunday, Steven made a test pass. The VW pulled a decent-sized wheelstand off the starting line, making a move towards the Christmas Tree. Steven pedaled it, pulled second, and the front end came back up again!
Steven kept everything together to return for a shot on Monday, the official start of Sick Week, and produced the 9-second pass he was looking for. Steven was able to make the trip to Bradenton Motorsports Park, but his Sick Week experience would end there. “I took a swing and torched it,” said Steven, admitting that the number 4 area of the cylinder head got a little warm, forcing him to be a spectator for the rest of the day.
Despite not completing Sick Week, Steven was optimistic. “The daily ‘commute’ during a drag-and-drive is the coolest traffic you will ever get stuck in,” said Steven. “Cruising around in your hot rod / race car is fun, but when there's several hundred of them all bombing down the same route on the same week, that's really something special.”
Since the completion of Sick Week, the cylinder head has been repaired, and the Beetle just a week or two away from being back together and operational. Steven is already making plans to invade Sick Week in 2024, hoping to collect more single digit time slips.
Written by Derek Putnam. Photos courtesy of Sick the Magazine and Steven Dalton.